Cross-cultural Psychology

HUM-299 / 2 crédits

Enseignant:

Langue: Anglais

Remark: Pas donnée en 2025- 26 Une seule inscription à un cours

Summary

Cross-cultural Psychology: Empirical Perspectives on Universality and Cultural Specificity. We discuss empirical evidence whether psychological processes represent universal features of human nature or are culturally constructed phenomena. We invite students to critically assess different views.

Content

At least in cognitive psychology, there is an implicit assumption that human cognitive functioning should be shared. Just like humans share a big part of their physiology, so do the mental capacities should also be alike - universal. However, such assumptions are challenged by views from other domains (e.g., anthropology, sociology), highlighting the importance of social and cultural contexts. In this course, we will take an empirical perspective and look for evidence in favour of universal vs. culturally relative psychological functions. We suggest treating relevant cognitive domains such as intelligence, learning and memory, language, emotion, perception, personality, and others. We will present a theoretical foundation on how cross-cultural empirical studies in psychology should be evaluated, then looking at the actual studies that support either perspective in order to compare these viewpoints, discuss, integrate, and synthesize conflicting findings.

Keywords

experimental psychology, evidence-based science, cross-cultural psychology, universality, cultural relativity, perception, cognition, emotion, language

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, the student must be able to:

  • Search for relevant literature
  • Describe previous research including their weaknesses and strengths
  • Synthesize research articles within a larger context
  • Demonstrate the ability to integrate different, or ideally opposing viewpoints
  • Formulate reasoning in oral and written forms
  • Defend your conclusion based on the former learning outcomes
  • Discuss relevant ideas in a class setting

Transversal skills

  • Make an oral presentation.
  • Summarize an article or a technical report.
  • Demonstrate the capacity for critical thinking
  • Give feedback (critique) in an appropriate fashion.
  • Take feedback (critique) and respond in an appropriate manner.
  • Communicate effectively, being understood, including across different languages and cultures.
  • Negotiate effectively within the group.
  • Set objectives and design an action plan to reach those objectives.

Teaching methods

The first part of the course will be dedicated to lectures on cross-cultural empirical methods and studies, allowing ample of time for discussions. The second part of the course will be dedicated to student oral presentations on the selected topic (in small groups), followed by the discussions and an in-class assessment of understanding.

Lecturers are present to support students

- in their preparation of the oral presentation

- in their literature search

 

Expected student activities

- Attend weekly lectures, many of which include presentations from peers, and contribute constructively to the discussions of other presenters.

- Find, read, and understand research articles that you will then use to present and discuss your analysis of the contradicting literature. Preference for recent literature, published in the last five years.

- In-class assessments after each peer presentation, testing for the general understanding of the relevant concepts in cross-cultural empirical psychology.

 

Assessment methods

- Evaluation of the oral presentation (50%)

- Evaluation of the in-class assessments (50%)

Supervision

Office hours No
Assistants Yes
Forum No
Others

Resources

Bibliography

Literature search will be part of the course. Teaching staff will be present to help with the literature search if needed.

 

Dans les plans d'études

  • Semestre: Automne
  • Nombre de places: 80
  • Forme de l'examen: Pendant le semestre (session d'hiver)
  • Matière examinée: Cross-cultural Psychology
  • Cours: 2 Heure(s) hebdo x 14 semaines
  • Type: obligatoire

Semaine de référence

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